Saturnalia Read Online Free PDF

road and damned to the memory.
    There was more. With extra tears and entreaties Ganna wrung her hands and beseeched me to help with a desperate problem. She wanted me to find Veleda before harm befell her
    'This is a very serious request,' I said gravely. Helena Justina glanced across sharply. I always loved having duplicate commissions, if they came with a double fee. 'And for a private informer, perhaps it is inappropriate.' Helena shot me another sarcastic glare.
    It did not stop Ganna. She was determined that I was the man for the business--for much the same reason as Laeta had been: I knew Veleda. Ganna believed that would make me sympathetic towards her missing companion, for whom she expressed worse anxieties. With more of those entrancing tears running down her pale face from her delicate blue eyes, Ganna said that ever since Veleda had arrived in Rome, she had been suffering from a mysterious illness.
    Veleda was sick? That really was bad news. Captives who are destined to adorn famous generals' Ovations are not supposed to pass away from natural causes first.
    It was bad news for me too. 'Abate the fee' was the Flavian emperors' motto: I would lose the extremely generous reward I had been promised by Titus Caesar if, when I produced Veleda, she was already dead.
    I told Ganna I was obliged to work for money and she assured me that she had it to give. She left her gold torque as a surety. I say 'left' because I quickly moved her out; I was uneasy about keeping her at our house. Apart from Albia's hostility, there was the coming problem of ten disgruntled brutes from the German legions. They would know who Ganna was and might report us to the authorities for harbouring a fugitive. Helena knew nothing about them yet, so I kept quiet about the soldiers.
    I persuaded my mother to take in the blue-eyed forest virgin. Ma was suffering badly from cataracts; although she hated needing a guide around her own kitchen, she was in so much trouble with her vision, she admitted she could use help. Ganna knew nothing of Roman domestic procedure now--but by the time my mother had finished with her, she would. It amused Helena to think of her one day returning to the wilds of Bructeran territory, able to make an excellent pounded green-herb dip. In Free Germany, she would never be able to find the rocket and coriander to show off at the tribal feast, but she would spend the rest of her life dreaming of Ma's egg white chicken souffle...
    I wanted Ganna kept somewhere under my control. Apart from the fact that it would salt her away from Anacrites' clutches, I was not fooled by the tears and hand-wringing. This young lady clearly had something she was not telling us. Ma would keep her under strict guard until either I found out the secret for myself, or Ganna was prepared to tell me.
    I was right about her hiding something. When I discovered just what she had omitted from her story, I saw why. She should have known I would find out, though. I was going to the Quadrumatus house next day.

VI

    The day opened on a cool, crisp morning with a bite in the air that would make your lungs hurt if you had anything of a cold. Most people in Rome did. It was the time of year when a visit to a public library was orchestrated by coughs, sneezes and snorts as constantly as the rattle of snare drums and rime of flutes at some dimly lit dinner party where your millionaire host's parting presents would include the pretty serving boys. If you didn't have a wheeze when you started the day, you would catch something by your return. I had to walk along the Embankment towards the meat market, where some snotty stallholder was bound to catch me with his filthy spittle as I passed.
    I was visiting a senator with consular connections, so I had dressed to a high standard. I was wearing a good woollen cloak, with oily waterproofing, my current best boots, which were leather with bronze tags on the laces, and a seductive Greek Mercury's hat. All I needed was wings